Issue of health-care reform emerges in races

Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are the marquee names in this year’s partisan fight over health care, but the undercard is pretty compelling, too.

In House and Senate races across the country, from New York to Wisconsin to Montana, the president’s health care law is re-emerging as a central issue in the fight for control in Congress. It already helped Mark Critz knock off fellow Democratic Rep. Jason Altmire in a western Pennsylvania primary last month. No matter what the Supreme Court decides, the aftermath promises only to add to the stakes.

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Here are five races in which the politics of health care figure to be pivotal:

Pennsylvania 12: Rep. Mark Critz (D) vs. Keith Rothfus (R)

Critz has to turn a quick pivot from a primary in which he and his union allies hammered Altmire for voting against the health care law.

He’s tried a nuanced approach. “The system we had [before the new law] was not working. Is the health care bill the answer? Does it solve all the issues? Well, no. It needs a lot of work,” Critz said at a debate, according to PoliticsPA. He also insisted that “I voted every time to support the bill in its current form and worked to improve it.”

National Republicans are eager to remind voters of Critz’s record of voting against their repeal efforts. The National Republican Congressional Committee started airing an ad to that effect Wednesday, and they believe Altmire’s defeat gives them a cleaner shot at winning a seat that was formed by combining two Democratic districts.

After the primary, the Cook Political Report updated the race from “lean Democratic” to “tossup.” Democrats plan to tie Rothfus to Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget, which would turn Medicare into a system in which seniors would get capped subsidies to buy insurance, as a way to blunt the GOP’s health care attacks.

Like much of Pennsylvania, the district — a hammerhead-shaped territory stretching from east of Johnstown to the Ohio border — is home to many seniors, and the fight over who pays and who benefits in the nation’s health care system promises to be a defining battle in the race.

“It’s not often you’re given a second chance in politics, but Mark Critz has passed up 20 opportunities to express his disapproval for Obamacare,” said Paul Lindsay, a spokesman for the NRCC. Critz spokesman Mike Mikus said Critz thinks “the best approach is to keep the good things and to reform the things that need to be reformed.”

For most Republicans running this year, their position on Obama’s health care law is cut and dried: It was a bad idea. But that’s a tougher sell for Thompson, the former Health and Human Services secretary, who in 2009, advocated for a national overhaul, saying “failure to reach an agreement on health reform this year is not an acceptable option.”

He even posed for a picture, now on the White House website, after meeting with administration officials and others to discuss how to implement the law.

Since then, Thompson has tried to distance himself from the health law by vowing to vote for its repeal if he is elected. He released a video last year that says American prosperity “starts by taking the burden of Obamacare off our backs.”

If Thompson can win the primary — he’s up against Republicans who are more than happy to remind voters of Thompson’s health care record — he’ll take on a strong advocate of the law.

The court granted a year's reprieve Thursday on its decision striking down a ban on private insurance.

By Rebecca Cook Dube | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

TORONTO – Canadians have long prized their public healthcare system as a reflection of national values, and have looked askance at the inequities of private medical care in the United States.

But now that the Canadian Supreme Court has ruled private health insurers should be allowed to compete with the public system, the future of Canadian healthcare is a question mark.

In the short term, the decision may light a fire under provincial governments to improve chronic problems, especially long wait times for surgeries, tests, and treatments. Some experts believe the ruling could eventually spawn a parallel, private healthcare system here.

"For our government, it's a very strong indictment of the way they've handled the system," says Dr. Albert Schumacher, president of the Canadian Medical Association. "I hope it will move us forward in the debate. 'Private' has always been used by politicians as a very evil word, associated with America and for-profit. But it's not necessarily so."

It all started with a disgruntled doctor, Dr. Jacques Chaoulli, and his patient, George Zeliotis, a retired salesman from Quebec who waited nearly a year for a hip replacement.

In a split decision, the Supreme Court in June found that waiting lists for medical treatments were unacceptably long, causing some patients to suffer or die. The judges struck down a Quebec law banning private health insurance for procedures covered by Medicare. Patients like Mr. Zeliotis should be allowed to go outside the public system and pay for timely medical treatments through private insurance, the court said.

"There are tens of thousands of Mr. Zeliotis out there languishing on waiting lists," Dr. Schumacher says. His patients, for example, go to nearby Detroit and pay out-of-pocket to get CAT scans in six days instead of waiting six months in Canada.

By the end of this year, the federal government has promised to establish benchmarks for "medically acceptable wait times" for treatment of cancer, heart disease, and other ailments. The government is already spending billions to try to reduce waiting lists.

Technically, the court ruling applies only to Quebec, and the court on Thursday granted the government's request to delay its decision for a year. But Chaoulli v. Quebec will eventually ripple through the entire country.

"No minister of health can say, 'We're going to deny you a right that exists in the province of Quebec,' " Monahan says. "As a matter of political reality, it's applicable in all provinces."

The man who sparked this revolution was often dismissed as a gadfly during the years he spent fighting the system. Dr. Chaoulli once went on a hunger strike to protest fines levied on him for charging fees. Chaoulli represented himself in court, and his rough yet impassioned arguments struck home with the court.

"I am so happy," Chaoulli says. "Sooner or later, the medical monopoly will be stopped."

He predicts the emergence of a private healthcare system existing alongside the public one, as in Australia or New Zealand. Meanwhile, he is busy lecturing conservative US groups about the dangers of socialized medicine.

"Libertarians and conservatives do regard him as a hero," says Michael Cannon, director of health policy studies at the Cato Institute in Washington, a libertarian think tank. "He's going to be a very influential figure moving forward in Canada, in the US, and abroad."

Cannon hopes Chaoulli's victory dampens the ardor for Canadian-style healthcare in the US.

All of these people out protesting against "obamacare"... just what is it they don't like about the bill?

I'll give you that it's a mess. But it's a mess because it came to be in the most partisan atmosphere this country has seen in decades. Universal Healthcare was the ideal plan... that wouldn't pass, then the public option... that got lambasted, so this is what you get. Not perfect but better than what was there.

It's just that to me it seems middle class conservatives in this country have been duped into protesting against their own interests over and over again.

If they voted for a healthcare bill that did not get bipartisan support,

That's the whole point genius. Nothing was going to get bipartisan support. If that were possible the bill wouldn't be such a mess.

People like you have been told that HCR is the devil and it's not. It's just an attempt to fix something that everyone acknowledges is broken. And in a way that republicans supported... but then that was before Obama was in favor of it.

This whole debate is so stale to me anymore. But once again republicans are caught in the past. Maybe the supreme court will rule against it. Then you can all have your way and we can go back to the broken system we had before. Just know that if that happens no significant attempt to reform health care will pass for some time.

The article suggests Canada is moving toward some degree of a private system within the public one they have now. I don't see anything wrong with that and it certainly says nothing to disprove what we already know about the costs and effectiveness of a system of... yes, I'm going to say it... socialized medicine.

It just seems that so often on the right people are arguing emotions and ideologies that have no practical aspect to them. It's like, "Why don't you like HCR?" answer: "Because it's socialism!" ... uh first of all, no it's not. 2nd, so what if it is?

Great, for whom, those that decide to go on vacation instead of being responsible and PAY FOR THEIR COVERAGE.

You people just can't get past square one, can you? The whole point is that everyone who pays for health insurance or is provided through their employer is ALREADY PAYING FOR THE UNINSURED. What this bill does is require the uninsured to BUY INSURANCE. HELLO?

It's personal responsibility exactly so that people like you and me aren't paying for the uninsured. That's why most republicans were in favor of it before Obama decided he was too. But once Obama decided he liked the idea, that's when it went from being about personal responsibility to being "Socialism!".

But, when potus decalres, "I WON SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP", a bipartisan agreement was not in the cards.

Soon after the talk of mandtaes, back in the 90s', the Heritage Foundation and the GOP backed away, something about unworkable and possibly illegal.

There, NOW, we have the rest of the story...

It was considered "unworkable" because, ironically, they didn't think they could get democratic support for a health care mandate ( my how times have changed, although, I guess the more they change they more they stay the same ). You made up the part about "possibly illegal". Nobody thought that.

Furthermore, the CURRENT republican presidential candidate passed an individual mandate when he was governor of Massachusetts in 2006! In fact, HE urged Obama to include it in his HCR legislation. Lol

Again, it's something republicans have always favored until Obama decided it was a good idea. Then they lambasted and demonized it. Because they decided to make Obama the issue and not the issues.

The fact is that this HCR legislation could have been an opportunity for both sides to come together because we all know health care is broken and the things in this legislation was something both sides had supported. But republicans decided to make it about Obama and not the people. Just poison. Just like the mentality on wall street and in the banking system. Poison, self interest, proprietary gains.

If they voted for a healthcare bill that did not get bipartisan support,

That's the point whole genius. Nothing was going to get bipartisan support. If that were possible the bill wouldn't be such a mess.

People like you have been told that HCR is the devil and it's not. It's just an attempt to fix something that everyone acknowledges is broken. And in a way that republicans supported... but then that was before Obama was in favor of it.

This whole debate is so stale to me anymore. But once again republicans are caught in the past. Maybe the supreme court will rule against it. Then you can all have your way and we can go back to the broken system we had before. Just know that if that happens no significant attempt to reform health care will pass for some time.

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Do liberals EVER assume responsibility for their OWN actions?

Democrats controlled both houses of Congress from January 2007 through January 2010, including controlling floor debates. To get bipartisan support, Democrats needed to conduct public debates, preferrably on the floor of the House and Senate and actually listen to the positions and concerns of Republicans. In order to earn Republican votes, Democrats needed to compromise and accomodate at least some of those concerns.

Instead, Democrats

1. Held closed-door meetings

2. Coerced, through bribes and kickbacks, several of their fellow Democrats to get their votes. Why would they need to do this to et the votes of Democrat legislators?

3. Famously said that they needed to pass the bill to see what was in it

Remember the Obama claim that the bill would be publicly debated on C-SPAN? Instead there was a so-called Health Care Summit where, rather than listening, Obama talked more than both Democrats and Republicans combined and refused to follow the advice offered by Republicans.

Remember the famous Obama comment "I won" meant to say I do not need to listen to your ideas since I controll the White House and have majorities in both houses of Congress?

It is obvious that the actions of Democrats were NOT the way to win bipartisan support.

Time for Democrats to put on their big boy pants and actually assume responsibility for their own actions instead of their incessant blaming of others.

Look, I'll be the first to put part of the blame on democrats here. I mean, they had all branches of the government for 2 years. I also don't think the financial meltdown was all Bushs fault, after all glass-steigal was repealed under Clinton and that was what allowed banks to merge with investment companies and led to this mess we are in now. There is plenty of blame to go around.

The mandate is something republicans liked until Obama liked it too. But without any real power in Obamas new administration they decided the way to fight was turning against the very legislation they had embraced and demonizing it. The public latched on. Democrats up for re election were afraid to support something that had such public skepticism and disaproval. And that tactic became and still is their primary weapon against Obama... attack his charcater, not the issues.

The hypocrisy is just STAGGERING. It's okay to have a government mandate a medically unnecessary, sometimes invasive procedure that a woman has to pay for and a medically unnecessary 'waiting period' to get that legal medical procedure, it's okay for the government to come between a woman and her doctor - but it's an outrageous, egregious attack on YOUR freedom, YOUR privacy, and YOUR interaction with YOUR doctor to have to buy health insurance - so I can stop paying for freeloaders like you like I do now.

And these are the SAME people lecturing others about 'fiscal responsibility' and screaming about THEIR freedoms being attacked?

Look, I'll be the first to put part of the blame on democrats here. I mean, they had all branches of the government for 2 years. I also don't think the financial meltdown was all Bushs fault, after all glass-steigal was repealed under Clinton and that was what allowed banks to merge with investment companies and led to this mess we are in now. There is plenty of blame to go around.

The mandate is something republicans liked until Obama liked it too. But without any real power in Obamas new administration they decided the way to fight was turning against the very legislation they had embraced and demonizing it. The public latched on. Democrats up for re election were afraid to support something that had such public skepticism and disaproval. And that tactic became and still is their primary weapon against Obama... attack his charcater, not the issues.

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Thank you for accepting that Democrats were intimately involved in making Obamacare into the mess that it is. After all DEMOCRATS wrote it and DEMOCRATS passed it without a singe Republican vote.

The housing bubble was not just a matter of the Glass-Steigal Act signed by Clinton but also the Community Reinvestment Act and corruption at Fannie Mae (a government sponsred enterprise) that encouraged and facilitated making home loans to more buyers. These activities encouraged (required?) relaxation of loan requirements to enable loans to buyers who could not afford make payments on those loans.

You provide no support for your claim that "The mandate is something republicans liked until Obama liked it too." During the 2008 campaign, Obama was against the mandate and said so during a debte with Hillary.

You claim that the Republican's "primary weapon against Obama... attack his charcater, not the issues." I beg to disagree, there are MANY issues on which Obama's record is vulnerable to legitimate attack.

Here are just a few:

* the lowest rate of economic recovery ever

* anemic GDP growth rates (2.2% for Q1 2012, sub 4% for each of the 13 quarters since he took office)

* an increase in the National Debt of over $5 trillion in just 39 months

* chronic unemployment in spite of massive "stimulus" spending

* massve deficits in spite of an Obama promise to cut the deficit in half by the end of his term

No matter how you slice it, the mandate is NOT in effect and the healthcare for the uninsured will kick in full gear sometime after Jan. 2014. Now, if this is about principle versus politics/lobbyist money, then go to where the mandate is actual real .... take your GOP/Faux News/DIck Armey/Koch Brothers backed protests to Massachusetts and Mitty Romney (i.e. Mr. mandate) today.

For decades the GOP said don't legislate from the bench, now that we have a GOP Supreme court and the case may be like the other political cases (Gore/Bush or Global Corporation= human being)..why aren't they telling the Roberts case to not get politics involved the will of the people (Congress)? It just seems hypocritcal

One of the few things both the far right and far left can agree on is the need to get rid of the Affordable Care Act.

A corporate subsidy program for the insurance industry disguised by the Democrats as "health care reform', the ACA is surely one of the most cynical twists of recent political years.

The Supreme Court's decision cannot come soon enough.

We will soon see whether Barak Obama wanted an insurance company subsidy or universal health care.

If he wants the later, he will find huge support among liberals, thinking Republicans, small business owners, youth and mainstream Democrats.

If wants to waffle, he will find nothing. The issue has been thoroughly vetted for over six decades. No one who pretends to leadership can say they need more time to study the issue.

When ACA is found to be unconstitutional, it will be time for Obama to step up or welcome the ridicule he will richly deserve. One "mistake" is forgivable. Just sitting on his hands, will be unforgivable.

The anti-Obamacare advocates are like the stupid GOPeons who are movitated by partisan politics, not reason. They are the like those that doubt man-made global warming, those who have enjoyed the employment benefits and social safety net that were created by unionists, who struggled and died for workers' rights, progressives and Democrats. Republicans opposed them and have tried to kill them or to profit from them as Bush tried to do by privatizing Social Security (which thanks to the GOP's unregulated Wall St. greed meltdown would have wiped out). Today's greedy Republicans like the Ryan Plan II are trying to do away with Medicare while raising costs on seniors, to cut programs for the poor and needy while maintaining their tax breaks, shelters, and loopholes for the super rich like Mitt Romney their poster child of Wall St. "greed is good" thinking who was able to take advanatge of the GOP-created tax dodges and to file 468-page tax returns, to keep their taxes at 13.9%

The Republican working class lackeys, blinded by their ignorance and bigotry, forget that historically that Republicans have NEVER represented the working class whom they con, incite, manipulate and exploit while they pick their pockets. The GOP NEVER mention that healthcare costs DOUBLED under Bush-Cheney or that Reagan began the wave of converting non-profit hospitals to for-profit that helped them make huge profits and obscene executive salaries while passing along costs to customers. They NEVER mention that under Bush-Cheney bankruptcy laws were changed not to benefit consumers but banks and creditcard companies, many of whom were later bailed out by taxpayers. The GOP lied and claimed that consumers were abusing their credit when in fact when the laws was changed the majority of bankruptcies were due to overwhelming medical bills.

In short, Republicans hate the ACA or "Obamacare" because it cuts into the profits of their healthcare benefactors. Notice that they do not want to repeal the equally costly Medicare prescription drug benefit giveaway to the drug makers and insurers that cost nearly double their quoted price and was actually passed in the middle of the night preventing drug price negotiation, the import of cheaper drugs from places like Canada while allowing cheap, import of often counterfeit Chinese drug components. Republicans have turned America into a "best that money can buy" country--our healthcare, our educational systems, our legal systems, and now our democracy which they have corrupted as they have become corrupted--by money. God knows all about it and no amount of GOP spin and burdening wealth will save them.